Coinbase Visa debit card adds support for dai stablecoin

Coinbase announced today that it would add support for decentralized stablecoin, dai, to its Visa debit card offering. Dai is the first stablecoin added to the offering, which was launched in April and allows customers in the UK and EU to spend cryptocurrencies from their Coinbase accounts. The Coinbase card currently supports Bitcoin, Ether, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, Basic Attention Token, Augur, Stellar, and 0x.The Coinbase card currently serves customers in over 29 eurpoean countries.

Why it matters:

• As noted in our BlockFi analysis yesterday, a continued trend we’ve seen this year is exchanges leveraging their positions as central sources of liquidity to provide ancillary services beyond trading. The added dai support for Coinbase’s card marks the latest example of cryptocurrency exchanges expanding their product offering and further dipping their toes into the traditional world of financial services
• Simply put, dai is different from other cryptocurrencies Coinbase has supported with its card to date. Rationally users do not want to spend cryptocurrencies they hold for investment purposes. Dai on the other hand due to its emphasis on price stability is designed to be used and spent. The addition adds more practicality to using the card.